Anti-Chevron activists have joined in a global event across five continents to protest against Chevron Corporation's track record on human rights violations and particularly the environmental damage caused by the international corporation.

Indigenous communities worldwide that are affected by the global
oil giant and its subsidiaries are calling on the corporation’s
management to finance clean ups and implement better
environmental policies.

Communities across at least 16 countries including Ecuador,
Argentina, Brazil, Nigeria, Canada, Australia, the United
Kingdom, Spain, Belgium, Switzerland, US, France, Romania, and
Bulgaria, are urging all consumers to boycott any product with
the Chevron brand, including Texaco.

Headquartered in San Ramon, California, Chevron Corporation is
active in more than 180 countries and is one of the leading
players in the oil, gas, and geothermal energy industries. They
are top market leaders in exploration and production, refining,
and chemicals manufacturing as well as power generation.

Just 40 miles outside of the company's global headquarters, in
Richmond, California, residents dealing with the negative aspects
of Chevron’s operation joined in the protests outside of
Chevron's refinery.

Led by Mayor Gayle McLaughlin, activists blame the company for
the failure to prioritize the health and safety of the Richmond
community, following 2012 explosion and fire which sent 15,000
local residents to the hospital and led to a $2 million fine for
Chevron.

"Chevron needs to shift its corporate culture and put health
and safety first, before its profits, whether in Richmond,
Ecuador, Nigeria and everywhere it does business," said
Mayor McLaughlin, Amazon Watch quotes in their press release.

The unprecedented global protest is happening ahead of Chevron's
annual meeting, scheduled for May 28. The activists are trying to
pressure Chevron CEO John Watson to reverse the company's
environmental record and to comply with an Ecuador court order to
pay $9.5 billion for environmental clean-up.

Ecuador is pushing Chevron to compensate 30,000 people who were
affected by oil extraction from its Texaco subsidiary from 1960
to 1990. Overall, Ecuadorian authorities say Texaco spilled 16.8
million gallons (63.6 million litres) of oil in the Amazon
rainforest.

The company denies wrongdoing and has called the court ruling a
product of fraud. So far no payment has been made to Ecuador, in
fact Chevron sued Ecuador in the International Court of Justice
in The Hague for violating a Bilateral Investment Protection
Treaty and for the lack of transparency in the suit.

Ecuadorian lawyer in the Chevron suit, Pablo Fajardo says that he
hopes the Anti-Chevron International campaign will lead to a
general denouncement of Chevron's environmental practices.

“We hope the whole world knows that this company is the most
criminal in the planet”, Fajardo told a local TV station, as
he revealed that the company hid the fact that hydrocarbons were
left by Chevron at their exploration sites.

Correa said that contamination evidence found by experts hired by
Chevron that tested areas once operated by Texaco, which was
bought by Chevron in 2001, was never given to the court.

"They did prior inspections of the different wells so that
the court would go to places where there was no pollution, trying
to deceive the justice system," Correa told reporters.
Ecuador was given access to those probe documents through a court
order.

The US oil giant dismissed Correa's accusations as
"baseless."

"This is yet another attempt by the Republic to distract
attention and evade its responsibility for conditions in the
Amazon," a Chevron spokesman said in an email, Reuters
reports.

Meanwhile RT's Ruptly, filmed dozens of protesters that visited
the drill exploratory site in Romania used by Chevron as part of
the International Day of Action against Chevron. The protesters
angry at the potential fracking of the region were met by police
officers guarding the area.

Chevron had won approval to drill for oil in October 2013, but
after residents blocked access to the site the fracking work was
stopped.

After resuming work by drilling for natural gas at the beginning
of May, the US Energy Information Administration revealed Romania
could potentially have 51 trillion cubic feet of shale gas.

Protesters are against the method used by the company, saying
fracking can pollute water supplies and trigger earthquakes.

"We don't want the gas rig there. We want our land as it used
to be!" one of the protesters told Ruptly.

Anti-Chevron rallies also took place outside Berlin's Brandenburg
Gate against hydraulic fracturing.

Demonstrators say Chevron has caused environmental harm in areas
where it operates. Much of the Berlin protest focused on Ecuador.

Activists also list a number of human rights violations by
Chevron throughout the world. Amazon Watch in their press release
says:

“The declaration by the affected communities makes clear that
Chevron has caused widespread and deliberate pollution across the
globe; has repeatedly violated environmental safety regulations;
and has allied itself with brutal military regimes that are
complicit in human rights violations, including the deaths of
environmental protesters in Nigeria and the use of forced labor
in Myanmar. Rather than address the criticism, Chevron has spent
hundreds of millions of dollars on "greenwashing" advertising and
aggressive retaliatory legal attacks.”